1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates, in general, to a microwave oven equipped with a toaster and a method of controlling the same and, more particularly, to a microwave oven equipped with a toaster having a plurality of heaters and a method of controlling the same.
2. Description of the Related Art
In general, a microwave oven is an apparatus that cooks foods using microwaves provided to a cooking cavity from a magnetron.
Recently, a microwave oven in which a toaster that toasts bread is integrated has been developed.
The microwave oven equipped with the toaster is disclosed in detail in Korean Patent Unexamined Publication No. 2002-45200.
In the microwave oven equipped with the toaster, the toaster that toasts bread is integrated in a body of the microwave oven, and an operation button that controls the operation of the toaster is disposed in a control panel in which various buttons controlling various operations of the microwave oven are disposed.
The toaster is provided with two slot openings, which contain the bread to be toasted therein, in the body of the toaster formed in a rectangular shape. Further, the toaster is provided with heaters, which are electrically controlled and radiate heat to toast the bread contained in the two slot openings, at opposite sides of each of the two slot openings.
The toaster is operated by a drive circuit that allows power to be supplied to the heaters of the toaster when the operation button of the toaster is pressed. The drive circuit allows the power supplied to the heaters to be cut off before the operation button of the toaster is pressed, while the drive circuit allows the power to be supplied to the heaters when the operation button of the toaster is pressed.
However, in the conventional microwave oven equipped with the toaster, the power is supplied to all of the heaters when the operation button of the toaster is pressed. Accordingly, the heaters are not individually operated. Therefore, the conventional microwave oven is problematic in that a portion of the power is supplied to a heater that is not used to toast the bread and the portion of the power is undesirably consumed.
Further, the toaster and the magnetron are independently controlled in the conventional microwave oven. Accordingly, when the operation button of the toaster is pressed, the toaster is operated regardless of a cooking operation being provided by the magnetron, so a consumption current is increased. Therefore, if the toaster is disposed in a wall mounted microwave oven having a limited consumption current, a circuit breaker in a home may be operated by a flow of an excessive consumption current, which can cause, for example, a power failure.